Ace
by leradny
Summary: Cid Highwind had a moment of glory, almost ten years ago. Or... maybe not.


**Ace**

_-break-_

Underneath the oil smells and cold metal, there is something warm and buoyant, like the air in a bakery. Sunrise. The clouds are bread-colored now, swarming thick around the horizon and the airships of the Aeolis fleet. Once the shivering has stopped and they are up in the air, Cid Highwind kicks back, takes a drag on his cigarette, and pulls the throttle so his ship coasts along on the invisible support of the wind.

"All clear," he announces into the headset. There is a chorus of scratchy repetitions from the other pilots as they move calmly through the air, with the kind of synchronization dancers strive for. Ansem, back in the day when he was still predictable and a little idealistic, would have been watching them take off from a tower; but as it was the absence of the King gives Cid a cold feeling in his gut. It's been a while now--a year, maybe? He would have thought that he'd have gotten over it by now, but...

A slight scratchy sound draws his attention back. "Cid?" Shera's voice comes up. Of course. The pilot fidgets with his goggles and sighs as loudly as possible, causing his cigarette to drop. However, he leaves it for the moment.

"Don't tell me. I've got my goggles on, oxygen tanks are full--"

"I know." Something about her very pleased tone makes Cid think she's smiling. "Just be careful, will you?"

"Yeah." He switches his attention to the reddening sky in front of him, then pauses. "You, too."

_-break-_

Chocobos are the only birds that don't fly in Radiant Garden, which Cid thought was really weird at first. But then, they come from as far away as Verdurity, a place where weird things came from as far as everyone at Hollow Bastion was concerned. But other birds are fair game--in fact Cid knows that his fighter pilots watch them for ideas. The airships slice through the sky over the border of Eos in a clean arrow formation.

Nothing beats this feeling--in the castle Cid feels cramped and defenseless in the dark. Even more so now, since it feels cold, but in the airships they catch currents of heat sliding up, and there's light everywhere even when the sun sinks because all the pilots take their light with them. Not to mention he's got a thousand-pound metal contraption armed to the teeth following his beck and call; in an airship, Cid feels safe. It must be the same feeling people get when they look up and wonder how anyone could possibly give up standing on the ground.

_-break-_

They're almost at Verdurity now. Cid sees the dark green splodge on the horizon and makes to turn the airship left, but then someone's voice comes on.

"Captain?" Irvine asks. "You--you might want to look back at the castle, sir..."

"What?" Cid twists, then remembers he can't see behind him due to the several walls of steel between his eyes and Hollow Bastion. He scowls, tightens his jaw so the fresh cigarette won't fall out, and turns on the scope he rarely uses. "What's wrong with the--"

Scratch: "Cid? I think we should go back!"

"All right, all right! I'm turning now." Cid pushes a button for a specific channel. "Kain! Hang back and lead us through reverse."

"Yes, sir."

"Everyone about face!" More scratching noises, then beginnings of a chorus of yessirs, then abrupt silence. From what Cid can see of the fleet as he executes his painfully slow U-turn, they're all following his orders; but why none of them have finished responding yet is beyond him. Then he zooms in on the castle and the cold feeling shoves back in with about eighty times its force.

Tendrils of darkness are protruding from the neck of the castle like snakes, or the arms of an octopus--thin and strong and eerily alive. The castle is shot through with it, like lighting breaking up the sky only reversed. Lightning is not mysterious; not even dangerous if there's the right protection on your ship, and it always goes away in a second or two. But Cid keeps watching and this dark evil cousin moves around like it knows what it's doing. Growing, almost like a plant. Like a _weed_.

Screw _that_.

A busy scratching sound and Kain comes in, sounding calmer than he probably is as always, only there's an edge of worry and fear in there that only people who know him can spot. "Uncle? Permission to go full throttle." They aren't close enough to see any panic. Cid remembers the bread-yellow clouds and the reassuring taste of the cigarette in his mouth (first one of the day) before taking out a fresh one and lighting it. That was then, a hundred miles away. Might as well be a hundred years.

"Permission granted," Cid tells him, and barks to the rest of the pilots, "Full speed ahead to the castle!"

There's a moment while he thinks about a fighting plan, if they need one. Damn Braig was never around when they could use a good sniper, but at least they'd find him in Ansem's Lab easy enough. He was always in the Lab--and if they managed to find him before _too_ much hell broke loose it'd be all good. Besides, Irvine was younger and turning out better than anyone'd expected in the field of aiming big guns at things. If only he wasn't such a flirt, and worked better under pressure...

"S-sir?" Irvine asks. "Can I ask you what exactly's happening?"

"Hell if I know! Just get your guns ready." A few words of acknowledgment, and then Cid turns his attention to Quistis. "Captain Trepe, take half and round off to the north-east over Eos with Kain. Shera and I will take the south-east."

"Right, sir." Ah, Quistis. Smart as a whip. He never had to worry with her.

"You've got a good head on you, Quistis--try not to get killed. And keep Kain alive, too."

"Does it look that dangerous from where you are, Captain?" The calm question makes Cid bite at his cigarette, effectively ruining the filter. Quistis tactfully replies to his silence, "I'll do my best, sir."

"Ah, scratch that--you're with me. Shera!"

Static: "Yes?"

"Speed up. You're going to take the northeast quarter with Kain and that half of the fleet." Silence, except for faint static in the background. No sign of a voice. After a second, Cid gives up and spits out his cigarette as the castle looms larger on the horizon, casting shadows on the ground. "Hear that, Shera?"

"Clear as light, I guess."

"So do it! I don't see you moving your ship around!"

"Cid, Kain can take care of himself. You _don't_ have to be the one who goes alone--"

"_Damn_ it_,_ just follow my order!"

"All... right." Scratch...

"_Good._"

"Be careful."

"You, too!" Cid watches Shera's airship peel away from the edge and steadily move towards Eos' side of the castle. Such a damn good pilot--he wished it wasn't in their blood to go up in the air sometimes, good enough to be sent head-first into danger like this... but where else would they go?

Airships don't go up all the time. If they did, they'd be no better than plants stretching their fingers to the sun. The point is going up until they're at a height they can handle, without popping veins in their head or accidentally blowing the tops off houses with the air they're displacing. They shift a little, sink or float a few hundred feet, but fantastic formations go sideways in the sky. If Ansem had been on the ground and watching them... What did he say whenever they did something especially awesome?

"The fantasy to end all fucking fantasies," Cid muses. "Or something like that." He switches to Kain's channel. "Kain!"

"What?"

"Change of plans: You're with Shera on the northeast quarter."

"I'm with Shera..." A moment of scratchy silence like the wool is being pulled off someone's eyes. Then Kain speaks up dazed and confused. "Cid, I thought I was supposed to be--"

"Doesn't matter what you thought. Change of plans, I said! Just follow my orders."

A buzz changes Cid's mood from whatever it was to really fucking annoyed, especially since it's his least favorite pilot speaking up. "Yo, boss?"

"What now?!" He hates it when Reno of all people interrupts him. Redheaded, pale, tall, and annoying like Irvine; but in terms of degrees Irvine gets about a six out of ten. Irvine is harmless, for all his skill in weaponry. Reno is not. From the moment that hot-shot stepped into a cockpit, Cid couldn't stop himself from scowling at him till Shera pointed out that Reno was an awful lot like himself--only with booze instead of cigarettes, and most importantly younger.

"I'm experiencing a lot of turbulence on my end. Not sure if I'm the only one..." As if Reno's nonchalant remark was the trigger, gusts of wind start wailing on the fleet and there's a huge shake in the formation. Cid's ship rocks hard enough for a few circuits to short out--lights flicker and his headset blares nothing but staticky white noise before recovering.

"Stupid Reno and his stupid--" Cid yanks on his jammed harness and yells into the mic: "Half-speed, try and ride it out. When we get to the castle, touch down and wait for orders. All clear?" More scratching and less voices than usual. But he doesn't see any flaming wrecks on the ground, so he isn't worried for now. He just takes the sudden gales as they come, wishing he had some idea of what was happening. Why hadn't Ansem sent out a distress call and ordered them to come back himself?

Unless...

The airships slam onto the ground almost clumsily; Cid does a quick check of the system and everything important is running, so he takes up a dusty spear before checking in with everyone else on his headset. "Everyone alive?" No negatives, so he assumes it's all good. Around Hollow Bastion it's hard to believe the sun's still out--the darkness bursting out of the towers swallows up any light, and there's an eerie silence over the blue stone bowl that holds the castle. No panicked screams, but the lights are going on and off with a crazy lack of rhythm.

_-break-_

"Sir." It's strange to hear Quistis' voice free of static, but having landed her own airship closeby she had decided to deliver her report in person--her communication system being among the ones that had been taken off-line. "Kain and Shera report people exiting by way of the main drawbridge. They're mostly civilians; castle guards are keeping the evacuation orderly. For the most part."

"Good. Good, now what do we do about Ansem? Any word of him?"

"No sign of him, Captain." She narrows her blue, blue eyes; not at him, but at something she's thinking about. "You never got a distress signal back over Verdurity, by any chance?" Cid sighs and takes a good long look at the castle. Odds are either that their leader _won't_ call on them--which he still finds pretty hard to believe--or just _can't_, which is believable but _incredibly_ bad news if it's true.

"Well, if he hasn't come up so far... I think we've got to be some big damn heroes."

_-break-_

"All right, troops. Battle plan!" Cid stands in the open cockpit of his airship, so his voice will carry across the crowd of pilots gathered near him. After briefing Shera and Kain on their roles in the plan, his headset had decided to give up. "First off--and everyone knows this part--we're looking for civilians and evacuating them as fast as possible. No innocents should be left--help out the guards if you have to. Shera and Kain are taking the upper floors with their half. You know the drill. And right now, _nobody_ try to be a hero. Got it?"

They file out obediently, different shades of hair growing more similar as the amount of darkness increases. Cid flicks his eyes down to the single pale yellow blur in front of him, calmly holding a gun across her torso. Quistis. "Are you ready, Captain?"

She puts down her rifle. "One moment." She removes a pair of glasses from her pocket, almost invisible in the fake twilight with their thin silver rims and clear glass. They glint a little as she slips them on; then she fixes her long blonde bangs and sets one hand at the trigger. The other hand (Quistis can use either one; she _never_ does anything by halves) goes to the handle of her trusty whip. "Now I'm ready, sir."

The drawbridge isn't too crowded by the time they get around to it, so their squads get through the door easily. Cid catches a glimpse of Shera with a gaggle of unorganized evacuees, ushering them away from the castle to Eos. Some of them are hysterical--obviously there's some pretty fucked up shit happening; maybe that Wizard went beserk and started murdering people with magic... But Cid will have to come back to that later.

_-break-_

Inside the castle it's cold, getting colder as they traverse deeper and deeper through the halls; and for some reason it's even windier than it is _outside_. Cid's cigarette goes out--he waves for the squad to go on without him as he drifts to the back and lights another. Only his lighter goes out, too, so he ends up stopping in a nightmarishly narrow hall just so he can keep a flame going. Part of him knows that this is stupid, stupid, stupid; but if he couldn't smoke now he'd go crazy.

Of course the torches haven't survived, so his lighter and the dim purple sky outside the windows are the only things enabling him to see. He hears something skittering around by him, maybe a black cat. Before he can get a grip on his spear a human-sized form charges right at him with the blade only really good guards can carry. Cid sidesteps the guard, but it turns out he wasn't even the target--there's a sound of something being gutted behind him and a flash of light.

"Captain Highwind?" the figure asks, sounding really stiff and proper. And _young_, judging from the awed note in his voice; way too young for this to be _any_ skilled guard. A bell starts ringing when Cid takes a look at his hair. That, plus the added cadet uniform silhouette would make identification much easier if not for Cid's total indifference to the newbs. "Is that you?"

"Sure it's me. But I'd like to know who's asking."

A quick salute, then a "Squall Leonhart, sir." Another goody-goody, Cid thinks. Quistis hit on him a couple times, like just about every other damn woman under twenty-five, but she got put off by his uptightness. (Which actually said _a lot_.) Then suddenly Squall's composure drops and he stammers out as insecurely as any other teenager, "I'd... I'd like to ask you what you're doing here alone, sir."

"For your information," Cid tells him, starting to walk briskly in the direction his squad had gone down. "I'm evacuating civilians and stopped for a tick. Just to light up. We should come across my pilots any minute now. What are _you_ doing here all alone?"

"Well... I'm looking for my friends, sir."

The apologetic tone throws Cid off. Attached to the name Squall Leonhart are phrases like 'cream of the crop', 'Ansem's favorite', 'follows orders down to the letter', 'never a strand of silky hair out of place'; so he wonders how this cadet could have ever made _friends_. "Everyone's out by now, probably. Tell you the truth, I'm looking for the King. If he can't make sense out of this, no one can." A thought. "Say, what was that thing you slaughtered just now?"

Squall twists. "I don't know--they sort of disappear when you attack them enough times."

"So, why exactly are they bad? Are they vampires, or evil dust bunnies or... what? What happens if they stick around too long?"

"They..." The cadet lifts his weapon over his shoulder and scans nervously. "They rip out people's hearts, and then... the people vanish." Cid thinks about the skittering noise--it'd been about the size of a dog, really. From how light it was. He'd also caught a glimpse of yellow not much further than a foot off the ground. "This way, sir."

_-break-_

Squall leads in front confidently, but that's about the only thing he's confident about. Guards have to know their way around the castle--the test they take requires months and months of study, both first-hand trekking through the castle and its grounds as well as poring over maps in the Library. Cid isn't too hot about feeling his way through the dark with the foot-tall heart-ripping things on the loose. "The lab isn't far now, sir, but... I need to stop by the Infirmary first."

"Oh, cor..." Cid inhales and exhales hard at this show of heroic courage. "Kid, if people did their job of not being selfish _bastards_ everyone's cleared out of there by now. _We_ should be out of here by now! I'm going to pop into the Lab for a second--one second--and then we're going straight back out with or without the King."

"No, I--" Squall shakes his head, almost pathetically torn between his emotions and the orders Cid has just given him. "No, sir, I can't. It's not far from here, and I need to see if... A-Aerith might not have gone with the others because she's..."

Ah, a 'she.' So it was _that_ sort of friend. Possibly. Cid starts to say something along the lines of 'my Captain Trepe has absolutely no delusions about manhandling women because she lacks that certain part, so if she's been anywhere near the Infirmary your little friend is fine' before he realizes something he should have done a long time ago--he hasn't seen hide nor hair of his squad since he dropped back and got attacked by that thing. "Hang on a tick--where's my group?!"

"Sir?"

"Never mind. Your plan's good, kid--quick check at the Infirmary, and then to the lab for the King."

"All... all right."

_-break-_

"'--pick on someone your own size?' Well, they're _my_ size! So why can't I--"

"No, Yuffie, you can't. I don't care if you can lift that thing, just _follow_ me!"

Squall looks around, confused as the two female voices ring through the hall. "Aerith?"

"Squall!" A young woman with long brown hair appears holding firmly onto the wrist of a smaller girl with hair cut close to her chin, dark enough to disappear in the torchless corridors. There's a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness. Tifa is--"

There's a deep, rumbling sound under the stones and they stop in their reunited tracks while their breath starts to mist in the cold. Squall turns, and then points to a gaping hole in the dark--a hallway. "The lab, Captain... It's right down that hall. Aerith, stay here and we'll be back in a few--"

"No," Aerith says, with a strange twang in her voice like metal ringing. There isn't a twitch from Yuffie, who has gone uncomfortably quiet in the older girl's hold and doesn't seem like the sort who would regularly respect her elders. "Don't go down there." Squall hesitates before shaking his head.

"He's looking for the King."

"The King isn't here."

The barely audible sound of well-worn leather creaking alerts Cid to Squall's tightening grip in the dark. When the cadet speaks, he sounds nearly desperate for something--not for their own safety, but because something he has been afraid of hearing for a long time is about to be said. "Ansem hasn't come out of the Lab for weeks, Aerith. He _has_ to be there."

"Nobody is there." At 'nobody', Yuffie drops something large and clearly metallic while she strains hard to release herself. Cid goes over and picks it up (lighter than he'd thought, but probably as wicked sharp as it looks), then carefully touches the smaller girl's shoulder.

"She's gone _cold,_" Yuffie whimpers, latching onto his wrist like it's a safety line. The pilot observes Aerith's eyes, which are green and visible in the dark, a little like Squall's ice-blue eyes; but at least Squall has a _reason_ for them to shine, with them being as light as they are. There's no reason for plain leafy-green eyes that aren't much lighter than anyone else's to _glow_ like that.

"All right," Cid snaps, drawing attention. Aerith jerks out of her unblinking trance and lets go of Yuffie, who gladly takes Cid's arm with her newly freed hand. "So the King's out according to you, missy." He turns to Squall Leonhart then. "What say _you_ get your brain working and get us the hell out of here like the quick cadet you are?"

"Yes, sir," Squall says obediently, almost relieved to have the responsibility of taking charge off his shoulders. He casts a hesitant glance at Aerith--who now seems a little confused--and then leads them briskly down the hall in the opposite direction of the lab. Luckily, both girls follow. "This way."

_-break-_

A metallic clanging noise sounds from outside a window several feet away. Cid stops and stares as he recognizes the unmistakable rumbling of an airship being set to hover--was that the sound from before? Airships taking off?

"Uncle!" Kain's voice peals suddenly through the halls, astonishingly close. "Uncle! ...need--"

"Kain!" Cid answers. "Keep calm, boy, I'm right here--"

"_I need a light!_"

The tallish, skinny form of his nephew bursts in with yellow eyes glinting behind him. The only thing that's stayed glowing is Cid's cigarette, but Cid takes out his lighter and flicks it open, illuminating a brief spot around them before Kain trips. Squall starts running for Kain's prone body and begins fending them off, little swirls of darker shadows arising as he defeats them one by one.

"Where's Shera?" Cid asks.

Kain gets up slowly shaking his head--to clear it. Then he scrambles up and grabs the lighter, staring into Cid's face before gasping, relieved, "It's _you!_" Aerith reaches out and touches his arm, concerned, as Squall finishes off the fourth and final shadow.

"Yeah it's me, Kain, but you were supposed to stay with--"

"She saw someone who looked like you," Kain answers, flicking his eyes back over his shoulder in a nervous way, even though Squall is walking back calmly. "She thought--"

"Clear the way!" a female voice declares through the entrance of the hovering airship outside. One window down reveals a familiar blonde head before a boot crashes through the glass. Kain flinches at the sound, but Cid smiles a little as Quistis clears the bottom of sharp edges. She climbs through, gracefully avoiding the shards, and brushes herself off after both feet crunch onto the ground. "All right?"

"All right, except for my nephew," Cid answers. "Captain Trepe, report for Captain S. Highwind."

There's an awful silence as their third blonde captain so far looks at the jittery face behind Cid. Then she shrugs, and starts clearing the window of more glass after reporting, "Last I saw, Ace, she was running over the drawbridge with Captain K. Highwind after her. But I see he's with you now."

Cid sighs. "Kain?"

"I..." Kain has not closed the lighter; in fact, he's holding it even closer to him and the flame makes him look skinnier than ever. He is not paying any attention whatsoever to Aerith's hand on his shoulder. "It was dark, and I couldn't see her after she went in--too dark, so I ran after her, but... when I looked, she just..."

_Disappeared._

"Right." Quistis gives one last kick to the window and removes the last of the glass for a relatively safe exit. "Everyone get into my airship. Hovering takes a lot of power. Kain... come on. Rydia's waiting outside the castle." She puts her hands on his shoulders and starts steering him to the airship. He stumbles along, keeping the lighter open. "You can close that up. Lighters need fuel, too, and I don't think Cid will be happy."

"I'll hold your seat while you get my nephew in," Cid says, heading off for the ship. "That is, if you don't mind?"

"I'd be honored, sir," Quistis replies. She turns to Kain once more and chides him. "Kain Highwind! Get a move on and close that lighter, would you?"

"You," Cid starts to say to the young black-haired girl with her throwing star. "Er..."

"Yuf_fie_," she answers proudly, hopping across the gap between window-ledge and airship with ease.

"And you two," Cid directs to the two brown-haired teens. "Board the ship while Captain Trepe finishes her job."

"I'll help," Squall offers quietly.

"Oh, _no,_" Quistis refuses the help with a smile in her voice. "You feel too sorry for him. I can tell. Go on, cadet." Cid looks on, amused in spite of himself. Yuffie and Aerith board the ship while Squall hesitates, but in the end the young cadet climbs into the airship anyway. "Kain," she says a little louder, finally losing her patience: "Would you let _go_ of that lighter?"

Kain starts struggling, trying desperately to keep the silver thing lit while Quistis attempts to grab at it, and the female captain finally succeeds at clicking it off. The remnants of the flame leaves a yellow halo of light around them, before Kain screams and Cid realizes that it wasn't an afterimage. "No!"

"Sir, _wait!_"

Cid lunges for the castle, and when Squall blocks the way he lets off a sloppy punch. "Out of my _way,_ you smarmy little bastard--my two best captains are in there!" The hit makes Squall flinch a bit, but he recovers just as quickly and blocks the way with his gunblade, sharp side to Cid. So, Cid would either have to impale himself to get through the cadet or make him drop it.

"Sir, we're in the light of the airship." Squall talks as clearly as possible through his injured mouth; Cid sees a little trickle of blood run down Squall's pasty skin. The lighting is different in here, it makes everyone look paler than they are... "We're safe." He twists to look behind him, at the suddenly silent window, and attempts to continue. "But your captains are both--"

"_No,_" Cid says, just as quietly--even though it's a little too forceful to be called entirely calm. "They're _not_. It's only been a few seconds! And _you,_ Squall Leonhart, will move before you make it--"

"With the number of things around them..." Squall starts to shake a little but holds Cid's gaze with a remarkable control in his shining grey-blue eyes. "They were caught by surprise, and it would have only taken a few seconds, sir..." The eyes are starting to water now, as Squall talks even faster while managing not to plead: "Sir, I've seen this happen before--they aren't stopped by armor or--"

"They are the two most capable pilots in my _fleet!_" he yells, overpowering Squall's voice. "They didn't _need_ armor! Now _stand down and let me through!_"

"I _can't._" Now it's begging. The statement is barely a whisper, as helpless as anything Cid's ever heard; and along with the tears dripping down Squall makes a pretty pathetic sight. It should be easy as pie to knock him over now, only... Cid realizes something.

"You... you weren't taught to pilot an airship by any chance, were you?" Squall shakes his head, completely silent now. So Cid stretches his head up in order to see over the quaking, bony shoulder in front of him. Nothing, and he can't even see if his lighter is out.

A light step announces Aerith's presence. Cid finally turns around with a sigh. "Innit, though. _Right._ And those two... it's a stretch, too much of a stretch. So. I guess it's time for me to do what I do best. Close the door, will you?" He leaves quickly, but not quickly enough to avoid hearing a gunblade being dropped onto the floor, or the sound of Squall closing the door and then sliding down, probably with his back to it.

"Squall?" Aerith asks, enormously gentle but still making it through to Cid. "Are you all right?"

Cid attempts to slam the door, but only manages an unsatisfying and very quiet 'whumph'. Quistis is too good at keeping her ship spick and span. Was.

He ignores that last bit while he susses out how the motherboard is configured. The throttle is there now, gears are shifted with buttons instead... and he's pretty sure that big yellow button labeled 'hover' will get them moving again. But one of the things about Quistis' ship is that she can only contact one other vessel. There's nothing but static in the headset when he puts it on no matter how many buttons he jams, so Cid takes it off and throws it to the side. It's too much to hope for that someone else would have taken up the Highwind, anyway.

_Well, __**damn, **_he thinks, starting to feel guilty about how he treated Squall as his head clears. _Kid's been standing with his back to monsters and his front to me yelling at him after I socked him in the face, and he only cried a little. Gotta give credit to Ansem's favorite._

_-break-_

The airship practically crumbles after everyone gets themselves out of it. Cid can hardly blame the thing; they rode it along hurricane-force gales in the dark, and it didn't really deserve his fumbling around at the console. Quistis might have done better, if only because she knew where things went. Cid brushes off some metallic flecks and calls, "All right? Everyone alive now?"

Squall nods in a distant manner. Cid can only hope that one punch didn't scar him for life (although he could have handled himself better, he has to admit). Yuffie still has her pointy wheel thing and replies readily. Aerith shakes out her red denim coat and nods, too.

"Good!" Cid looks around. It looks like Eos, only dingy and depressed, with no red roofs or people in sight. "Now where the hell are we?" Aerith drops the name: Traverse Town. Her eyes aren't glowing, but he takes her word for it and gestures for them all to follow him. "Well, come on then! Let's get ourselves acquainted with the place, shall we?"

He can apologize to Squall Leonhart later.


End file.
